


It Was Time for the Big Guns

by YouCanJive



Series: Time is the Longest Distance (Between Two Places) [5]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: (I can't believe that wasn't a tag yet), Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Darcy Lewis Feels, Darcy Lewis Needs a Hug, Gen, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Sir That's My Emotional Support Rhodey, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, but he's trying so hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 12:56:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19441903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YouCanJive/pseuds/YouCanJive
Summary: In the two years since Tony and Darcy had started to get to know each other, Darcy had determined a few things about Tony.Foremost among them was that Tony was immensely kind. And immensely sad.He was also pretty terrible at expressing human emotion, always trying to pass himself off as somehow immune to it and brushing off moments of real emotion with crudity and humor. He tried very, very hard to act like he didn’t care about anything. Darcy couldn’t understand how the press and the public could believe that image when it was so clear to her how very deeply Tony cared about just about everything.





	1. Darcy

In the two years since Tony and Darcy had started to get to know each other, Darcy had determined a few things about Tony.

Foremost among them was that Tony was immensely kind. And immensely sad.

He was also pretty terrible at expressing human emotion, always trying to pass himself off as somehow immune to it and brushing off moments of real emotion with crudity and humor. He tried very, very hard to act like he didn’t care about anything. Darcy couldn’t understand how the press and the public could believe that image when it was so clear to her how very deeply Tony cared about just about everything.

Darcy wondered what had happened to him, to teach him to fear showing interest, or love, or any emotion, or to associate such displays with weakness of some kind.

After lengthy discussion, her parents and Tony had decided Tony and Darcy’s bond should remain a secret, to protect her from the madness and the press associated with the Stark family. That didn’t stop Darcy from discussing Tony with her therapist in the most concrete terms she could without giving away his identity.

Dr. Hughes, who Darcy had been seeing for years, reminded Darcy at every session that she was supposed to be focusing on her own mental health and that it was not her job to somehow try to heal her soulmate. Especially, Dr. Hughes emphasized, since Darcy was still a teenager, and one who had recently gone through a very traumatic and life-changing experience, while her soulmate was an adult. Darcy should focus on taking care of herself. She had to trust him to take care of himself.

But Darcy didn’t think Tony _could_ be trusted to take care of himself.

She could tell that he really made an effort with her, to be open and honest. But he still saw her as a _kid_ and he disguised his most self-destructive thoughts and habits from her.

Darcy had tried to speak with him about it a couple times, but both times he’d pretended to be called away and had disconnected the call.

Darcy hoped Tony talked about it with someone, even if it wasn’t her. She knew he was close with his driver, Happy, and with Pepper, of course, but from the way he spoke about his interactions with them, she didn’t think he was nearly as open with them as with her.

She knew Tony had a best friend, though. Rhodey.

Darcy could hear Tony’s smile when he spoke about Rhodey. And from what Tony had said about the dynamic of their friendship, Darcy thought Rhodey might be just the person to push Tony to talk about the things he didn’t want to talk about and to face the things he did not want to face.

Darcy hoped to meet Rhodey one day.

(She wondered if Tony ever spoke to him about her, and if his voice had a smile when he did it, too.)

Once, during one of their weekly calls, Tony made a joke about missing giving a keynote speech at a robotics conference because he’d “made some new friends and was otherwise indisposed.” Darcy didn’t know why he bothered trying to edit his story when she understood perfectly what he meant. Even if she hadn't, the celebrity gossip shows had whole segments dedicated to Tony’s many “new friends.”

Darcy sent her mother a surreptitious look and turned slightly on her seat to give her back to the ever-present chaperone on her phone calls with Tony, before lowering her voice slightly. “But that’s not funny, Tony. You love getting up on a stage and talking robotics. Why would you do that?”

Tony was silent long enough that Darcy wondered if their call had been accidentally disconnected. Finally, Tony spoke.

“It was just a stupid talk, kid.”

“It wasn’t,” Darcy insisted, her temper rising. “Don’t lie to me.”

“Look, they didn’t care what I had to say, they just wanted to put my name on their conference program,” Tony replied, and his voice was louder and harsher, too. And so, so bitter. Darcy didn’t remember him ever speaking to her like this before.

“And you think your _new friends_ cared about anything but your name?”

The words had shot out of Darcy, angry and unkind and frustrated. She thought about taking them back, but she really had meant them. She braced herself for an equally explosive response from Tony.

He hung up instead.

Darcy waited until her mom was out of the house the next day and called Tony back, ready to try to talk about it. For the first time ever, she got his voicemail.

After her parents had gone to bed, she snuck downstairs and tried again. Again, she got his voicemail. He didn’t respond to her email.

The next week, she waited beside the phone at the usual date and time for their weekly call. As the minutes passed, Darcy grew more and more still while her breathing grew more and more shallow. Her mother watched from her usual spot across the room with fiery eyes.

When the phone rang, seventeen minutes past their usual time, Darcy picked it up before the first tone had even finished ringing. On the other end, Tony spoke like their last conversation had never happened.

Darcy played along.

After she hung up the phone, she cried and cried and cried while her mother held her.


	2. Tony

Something was wrong with Darcy.

Things had felt off between them since… Tony didn’t know what to call it. Since she’d pushed him. Since he’d hung up on her. Since he’d ignored her.

Had he made a mistake, deciding to get to know her? To build a relationship? He’d been drawn in by her, by the idea of a soulmate, of somebody who could understand and want and love him, undeserved as it was. Tony could count in one hand the number of people who had done that, who had loved him for himself, and not for who he was.

His mother. Jarvis. Rhodey.

The first two were dead. The last two had been paid to be around him.

The possibility of adding in a fourth to that number had been so overwhelming, Tony had not been able to refuse. Not after he thought he’d lost that opportunity forever.

But Darcy was so young.

And the threat that her parents would take her away from him if they thought he was harming her or being a bad influence was too real.

He walked a fine line with her.

Trying to be honest with her, because she was the other half of his soul and he spent so long lying to others, he should at least be honest with himself.

Trying to protect her from himself. His demons. Everything that was ugly in the world.

When she’d pushed, he’d gotten angry, yes. But, even more, he’d been afraid.

Afraid that she had seen the ugliness he’d been trying to hide.

Afraid that he had shown her too much of himself.

Afraid of his own anger. Of what it could do to her.

(He remembered anger in the eyes of a man meant to love and know him. How he had taken the pieces Tony had shown him of himself and thrown them back at him, sharpened and aimed at the spots that would hurt the most. He remembered learning to hide himself so nobody could ever hurt him like that again.)

After… The Talk (The Argument?), Tony had thought about pulling away. To protect himself. To protect her.

For the first time, he ignored JARVIS’ warnings of her incoming calls. He left her email unanswered.

(He had meant to leave it unread, but halfway through a bottle of whiskey, at 4 in the morning, he found himself asking JARVIS to read it.)

When JARVIS reminded him it was almost time for their weekly phone call, Tony kept working. And when JARVIS asked, at exactly 4:59pm, if he should place the call, Tony told him _no_. Instead, he got up and walked over to the wet bar in the lounge attached to his workshop. He poured himself a drink. This was for the best. He didn’t need a soulmate. And Darcy was better off without him.

By the time he’d finished his drink, his resolve had crumbled. He was a selfish man.

He dialed the number from memory.

But something had changed since then.

Tony couldn’t quite put his finger on it at first. He’d been trying to pretend like nothing had ever happened, and Darcy seemed to be willing to play along. It took him a while to realize what was wrong.

Darcy no longer pushed him.

She also, he was startled to realize, barely spoke of anything of substance anymore.

It took him going back through their emails to really notice, but then he couldn’t believe it had taken him so long to realize.

Before she’d spoken with him about any and everything. Tony joked that she used their calls and emails a bit like a diary, to lay out and work through her problems with her friends, her indecision about what she wanted to do with her life, her fears about leaving home the next year, or her frustration with her parents’ treating her like a child. Sometimes, Tony gave her advice, but most of the time he just listened. He had a feeling she didn’t usually share her issues and thoughts like these with many people, and he felt so lucky she was willing to share this part of herself with him.

But for weeks now, Darcy had only shared superficial accounts of her day, funny anecdotes, and straight-forward answers to his questions. He mentally catalogued their conversations and emails (and asked JARVIS to play back a few of their phone conversations to make sure) and realized that it had been weeks since she’d brought up a single issue, since they'd skirted the slightest conflict.

Something was wrong.

During their next phone call, Tony purposefully asked Darcy how things were going with Meghan.

Meghan had been one of Darcy’s best friends before she got sick, and they’d the rekindled a friendship in the last year. Last Tony had heard from Darcy, though, Meghan had been making jokes about how Darcy was so lucky, because she could “play the cancer card” in her college essays and would get in anywhere.

Tony knew Darcy had a lot of mixed feelings about Meghan. But when he asked this time, she just said that everything was “a-ok!” between them.

When he asked in an email how Darcy’s parents were doing, Darcy said they were “fine,” and told him all about how her mom tried to make a cake for her dad’s birthday and burned it, but her dad ate it and pretended to like it anyway.

Tony decided the time for subtlety was over.

During their next phone call, he re-visited the story of the robotics conference. He could practically feel her tension through the phone line, but Darcy just _uh-huh’d_ and _mhm’d_ her way through it.

So. It was time for the big guns.

That night, Tony called Rhodey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Reesachan for the idea to make the car obnoxiously pink! I love the brotherly needling, and Tony would never give up the opportunity to annoy Rhodey, even if (or especially because) he's trying to show his gratitude.


	3. Rhodey

Over decades of friendship, Rhodey had learned not to be surprised by anything when it came to Tony.

Even so, Rhodey was definitely thrown by Tony’s call.

It was the first time Tony had ever called him for advice like this.

Further, Tony sounded vulnerable in a way Rhodey didn’t think he’d ever heard before.

Tony had not told Rhodey about his soulmate at first. In fact, he had not told him until she had asked him to go to Idaho to meet her family. Tony had accepted the offer, hung up, then immediately called Rhodey to beg him to go along and tell him what a terrible idea it was for him to go meet his underage soulmate’s parents.

Rhodey had pushed aside his surprise, like a good army man, and talked Tony down. Then, when the conversation had ended, Rhodey had carefully made sure the line was disconnected then _howled_ with laughter. There was something just too ironic, too much like karma, about Tony Stark freaking out about how to make his teenage soulmate’s parents like him.

Rhodey hadn’t met Darcy yet, but he’d heard a lot about her. Tony was a very private person, but he was also endearingly attached to the girl, and Rhodey was the only person he trusted with the very news of her existence, let alone the ordinary details about how she had been so good as the shopkeeper’s daughter in her school play and how she was as ridiculously into the Doctor Who reboot as Tony.

Rhodey was looking forward to meeting Darcy one day, because from what Tony described she had to be pretty amazing. Though he was also looking forward to meeting her precisely so he could see her through his own eyes, rather than Tony’s. In part because he was sure Tony’s view was distorted, as it often was. In part because he wanted to make sure she was not trying to take advantage of Tony.

Yes, yes, she was his soulmate. But soulmate bonds weren’t automatically good relationships. And it wouldn’t be the first time somebody had tried to get close to Tony only to take advantage of him. Even if Darcy was perfectly lovely and was truly a friend to Tony, Rhodey wanted to make sure she would not be causing Tony any trouble.

Because Tony was clearly already fully aboard the Darcy Express, and Tony did not do things halfway. Rhodey knew perfectly well that once Tony Stark decided you were one of his, he would give you the beating heart out of his chest if he thought it would help. Tony’s self-destructive tendencies only helped the matter, really.

Case in point: this conversation.

“So, wait… you think something’s wrong _because_ nothing’s wrong?” Rhodey sounded incredulous. Partly because he wasn’t sure he understood what the problem was. Partly because he couldn’t believe he was having this conversation.

“No. No, Rhodey, just… just listen to me, ok?” Tony sounded like he was losing it. “I know something is wrong because Darcy is acting like everything is fine. But it isn’t. There’s always something going on, Rhodey: she’s a teenager. But I brought up all the sore points and pushed all her buttons, and nothing. I messed it all up and she’s not talking to me anymore and _I don’t know how to fix it_.”

“Ok. Ok, Tones. Let’s just… take a deep breath and we’ll figure it out. We’ll fix it, ok?” Rhodey used the tone he used when his Nana forgot where she was, or when he found one of his men a little too close to the edge. When he’d heard Tony take a couple deep breaths over the line, he continued. “Ok. Why do you think you messed up?”

There was silence on the other end. Rhodey knew how difficult this was for Tony. He hated asking for help. He always wanted to be the one in control. “We had a fight. Or… not really. I don’t know. An almost fight?” He paused. “I hung up on her.”

“What was the fight about?” The silence dragged on and Rhodey wet his lips before trying again. “Tony?” Tony hummed slightly to show he was listening. “What was the fight about?” Rhodey could hear Tony breathing on the other end of the phone, but he still gave no response. Rhodey closed his eyes and rested his head against the back of his chair. _Oh, Tony_. “Ok, let’s try something else. Why did you hang up on her?”

“I was angry. I… didn’t want to talk about it and she did and I didn’t want to argue.”

“Ok, I get that. Sometimes you need to retreat and regroup. So then what did you do?”

There was the sound of Tony shuffling around on the other end, a soft ‘clank’ that told Rhodey he’d been tinkering with something while they spoke, but he’d put it down now. “Nothing. I just… She called and emailed me a few times, but I didn’t pick up. I thought… maybe it was for the best.” He’d gotten quiet. Rhodey tensed. A quiet Tony was never a good sign.

“Maybe what was for the best, Tony?” he asked, gentle, quiet.

“If we left if there. If we were just… angry and just went our separate ways. Didn’t have to worry about hurting each other.”

Rhodey closed his eyes and reached for the tiny cross that rested beneath his dog tags.

Sometimes, Tony just about broke his heart. Sometimes, he wanted to fly out to New York, dig up Howard Stark, and kick him until he was just dust and a footnote in the history of Stark Industries.

“But then…”

Rhodey’s lips twisted into a small smile. “She called?”

“No. No. _I_ called.” Rhodey’s eyes snapped open and he sat up in surprise. “I wasn’t planning to, but… I don’t know. I missed talking with her.”

“That’s great, Tony.” _I’m proud of you_ , he thought, but he knew it would only spook Tony. It was enough that he’d come to him with the conversation. If Rhodey brought his own emotions into it, Tony would revert to his defense of humor and jokes and they’d never get to the core of the problem. “Did you talk through the argument?”

“No. I just… asked her about her classes, like normal.”

“Did she bring it up?”

“No, she went along with it. Answered my questions. Talked about some movie she’d seen with her parents, I think.” Tony paused, and Rhodey tried to think of what to say. He was no specialist in the minds of teenage girls. Even if he had been, it was hard to advise Tony when all he knew came from Tony’s own limited understanding of what had happened. But then Tony continued. “Do you think she’s still angry? That she wants to continue the argument, but is upset I won’t?”

“It’s possible,” Rhodey speculated. “Has she brought it back up?”

“No. I even brought it up the other day, to see if she’d say something, but she didn’t. That’s what I’m saying, that she’s just… I don’t know, gliding through our conversations now. She’s quiet. Just answers questions and talks about school and Doctor Who or whatever. Nothing real.”

He sounded so confused and concerned. Rhodey closed his eyes and tried to think of anything that could help his best friend.

“So, maybe she’s still angry and she wants you to apologize. I hear teenage girls can hold a grudge. Maybe she’s trying to give you a taste of your own medicine: you won’t talk about your thing, so she won’t talk about hers.” He paused. “Or she could just be upset for some other reason – I know this is hard for you to accept, Tony, but not everything is about you – and she’s just trying to work through that on her own. She’s gone through a lot, from what you’ve said. She might be trying to sort through it by herself, now that she feels she has the time and the space to do it.”

“But why wouldn’t she talk to me about it?” Tony interrupted and Rhodey couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

“I don’t know, Tony. I’m just trying to think through some fucking possibilities here.”

“So that’s the burnt rubber I smelled,” Tony muttered, and Rhodey couldn’t help but smile, because it was just so Tony.

“Yea, yea, laugh it up, genius. But you’re the one asking me for help, so what does that say about you?” Tension broken and Tony’s comfort restored through the small laugh break, Rhodey returned to the matter at hand. “It’s also possible that she’s confused.”

“About what?”

“About you. What you want from the relationship. Why you got upset. What might cause it to happen again. She’s probably just as confused about the whole relationship as you _and_ she’s a kid. She might just be trusting that you’re the adult and that you know what you’re doing, God help her, so she’s trying to follow your queue: you act like nothing happened, she acts like nothing happened. You don’t talk about your shit, she doesn’t talk about hers.”

“That’s stupid. And messed up. Just because I… I mean, it’s not the same at all.” It sounded like Tony was pacing now. “Christ, you really think that’s what she’s doing?”

“I have no idea!” Rhodey cried out. “I’m not a teenage girl. I don’t think I’ve even talked to a teenage girl since _I_ was that age. And I don’t even know her. She’s _your_ soulmate. Terrifying as the thought is, _you’re the expert here_!” He chuckled before returning to a more serious tone. “But it sounds to me like you may need to have a real conversation with her, complete with all those scary emotions. Because if you say something is wrong, I believe you, but you’re not going to solve it by talking to me.”

Tony groaned. “In the wise words of the source of all my troubles: this sucks.”

“Yea, you might not want to call her ‘the source of all your troubles’ when you speak to her, dude.”

“Funnily enough, that one I’d figured out on my own.”

“Good, because from here on out I’m charging you for my counseling services. Don’t worry, you can pay me in cool tech.”

He could practically hear Tony roll his eyes from the other side of the country.

The next morning, there was a brand new, fancy sports car in the most obnoxious shade of pink imaginable parked in front of Rhodey’s apartment, topped with a big bow. He knew a “thank you” would only fluster Tony, so instead he turned around, made a goofy face, and snapped a selfie with the car in the background.

He really hoped Darcy deserved Tony.


	4. Tony & Darcy

Chuck didn’t look the slightest bit surprised when he opened the front door late Saturday afternoon to find Tony.

He took a sip of the coffee in his hand, turned around, and walked back in, letting Tony come in and close the door behind him. “Darcy should be home any minute.”

Tony followed him into the kitchen. The table was covered in newspapers and an old typewriter sat on it, in pieces. Chuck started to gather the tools and pieces spread out over the table, methodically putting them away in a well-worn toolbox. Tony watched for a second, rocking on his feet with his hands in his pockets, but he couldn’t stop himself for long.

“Whatcha working on there?”

“It’s an old Olivetti M40. Darcy found it for dirt cheap at an estate sale a couple months ago and decided she just had to have it. Turns out it was dirt cheap because whoever last used it had no idea what to do with it and messed it all up.” Chuck shifted so Tony could step closer, and pointed out each of the problem areas as he listed them out. “I’m not sure what they did to it, but some of the keys are rusted so badly they won’t budge, the carriage return keeps getting stuck, and a few of the strikers are missing altogether. We’ve been trying to get the replacement pieces over the last few weeks, then when we finally sat down to fix it we realized we didn’t have the right screwdriver. Go figure.” Chuck shrugged. “Darcy went to the hardware store to see if they had any that would work.”

“Mind if I…” Tony motioned at the assembled materials with a loose, circular motion.

“Go right ahead. But don’t start fixing anything. Darcy’ll be angry if we do anything without her.”

“Huh. I had no idea she was into mechanics,” Tony commented, his attention split between Chuck’s words and the typewriter.

Chuck snorted. “Let’s say that it’s a recent interest.” Tony’s hands stilled where they’d been reaching for the ribbon spools.

“Oh.”

“Yea,” Chuck responded, watching as Tony slowly but deliberately returned to his perusal of the typewriter pieces before him.

“She hadn’t mentioned it,” he said, trying for a casual tone.

“Hadn’t she?” Chuck asked, wryly. Then, more seriously: “She has seemed a bit quiet lately.”

Tony dropped the piece he’d been holding, and it landed back on the table with a ‘clank.’

“Look, Mr. Stark,” Chuck started, turning to face Tony fully.

But whatever he was going to say was interrupted by the front door swinging open with a bang.

“Got it! I showed Mr. Hill the screws and he found just the thing. He said most people use it to fix guns, actually,” her voice projected in from the entrance, over the sound of her shaking off her jacket and shoes. “There’s something poetic there, isn’t there, about the pen and the sword? The typewriter is mightier than the –”

Darcy had finally turned the corner to enter the kitchen, holding the screwdriver aloft, but had frozen in her footsteps when she’d caught sight of Tony standing at her kitchen table. “Oh. Hello.”

Tony wiggled his fingers in greeting. “Hey, kid.”

“Ok, well, I’ll take that,” Chuck said, stepping in towards Darcy and taking the screwdriver from her, planting a kiss on top of her head in return, “and leave you two to talk. Maybe in the living room? Away from the sharp objects?”

“Dad!” Darcy exclaimed, her voice equal parts outraged and embarrassed. Tony could never forget her age, but every once in a while she did or said something that just absolutely drove it home just how very young she was.

“Go now and I won’t even insist on sitting in the corner,” Chuck replied in a sing-song voice. Darcy groaned, but turned around and headed to the living room.

“I guess I’ll just… go, then,” Tony said, unsure if he was speaking to himself or to Chuck, really, before following after her.

Darcy was sitting on the sofa, with her legs crossed in front of her and a yellow throw pillow held loosely on her lap. She was looking down in a position that would have usually made her hair cover her face, but she’d braided it back to work on the Olivetti, so Tony had a clear view of most of her face. She was biting her lip and looking off somewhere to her left. She looked upset.

Tony took a deep breath and braced himself, thinking of Rhodey’s advice. He was the adult. He could do this.

“What’s wrong, kiddo?”

Darcy shrugged and refused to meet his eyes and yes, ok, she was definitely a teenager.

“Come on. Something’s been off the last few weeks. We should talk about it.”

“It’s _fine_ ,” she replied, sounding like someone who’s been asked if she’s really sure she’s ok one too many times.

“Right. It’s fine and I’m Santa Claus.”

“You do keep giving me Christmas gifts, even though I’m Jewish,” she replied with a smirk, still not meeting his eyes. Tony sat on the edge of the closest armchair and leaned forward, resting most of his weight on his knees.

“You know, deflecting with humor is sort of my signature move,” he shared teasingly, before resuming his serious tone. “But really, Darcy. I know neither of us wants to do it, but I really think we should talk.”

Darcy took a deep breath, then sat up and met Tony’s eyes. The slight frown from before was gone, replaced with an attempt at a neutral smile that looked just a little too tense around the edges.

“Alright, Mr. Stark. What do you want to talk about?”

Tony held her gaze, but Darcy was stubborn. She leaned back and crossed her arms, because that pose clearly conveyed the message that nothing was wrong. Tony suppressed every instinct telling him to do the same, to avoid the topic, to just let it go. But something was wrong and Darcy was too important for him to just… let them both keep pretending while the relationship festered. He thought back to his conversation with Rhodey and tried to channel his no-nonsense approach.

“Are you mad at me? Do you want to take a step back from… all this?” ( _Do you want to take a step back from me?_ )

Darcy looked genuinely shocked by the question.

“What? No!”

“Ok. Ok, good. Because I don’t either, alright? You’re very important to me.” It went against every one of his instincts to make himself vulnerable and put himself out there with such honesty. But it wasn’t nearly as hard to do as Tony had thought it would be.

Not when it was Darcy he was telling.

Not when her eyes welled up and a weight seemed to leave her shoulders at his words.

Not when the alternative was apparently her _not_ knowing how very important she was.

“You’re very important to me, too,” she said, and her voice was shaky and so quiet, like she was holding back tears, like this was news to her. (Christ. How _could_ she have known, when he never said? Tony could have kicked himself. He was a terrible soulmate.) “I just…” She cut herself off, swallowing around the evident knot in her throat, and her eyes back on that invisible spot somewhere over his shoulder, off to her left.

“Just what, Darcy?” Tony pressed, gently.

Again, she shrugged, but a couple tears spilled over onto her cheek. She brushed them off with a quick flick of her hand, still not meeting his eyes. “I don’t know. I just… I don’t know what you want. I don’t want to annoy you or piss you off or whatever and have you never talk to me again.”

She rolled her eyes at herself and shrugged as she said it, like it was silly.

Like it was nothing.

Like she wasn’t holding her heart out to him and hoping he wouldn’t crush it.

But her voice broke and she was really crying now, and here she was, trying to be whatever he wanted, and Tony was _the foulest person in the world_ , because he had done this, and how could he have ever made Darcy think he wanted her to be anything but herself?

Tony didn’t even register his own movement before he was crouched on the ground in front of Darcy, one hand holding hers on her lap and the other on her cheek, holding her head up so she would meet his gaze.

(In the back of his mind, he vaguely registered that this might be the most physical contact they had ever shared.)

“Darcy, I’m _sorry._ I’m so sorry I made you feel like you had to change anything about yourself, or like you couldn’t talk to me about it. I don’t…” He bit the inside of his cheeks and breathed deeply through his nose. Darcy was still crying, but her breathing had slowed and she was looking straight at him now. “I would never just leave you behind.”

“ _But you did_!”

And suddenly Darcy was standing over him, and Tony was sitting on the carpet, his arms thrown back to hold himself up, and Darcy was still crying but she was also _angry._

“You got angry or upset or I don’t know what and you wouldn’t speak to me! And I couldn’t do anything about it, because you’re Tony fucking Stark, and I’m just some random kid, and if you don’t want to talk to me _there’s no way for me to even get to you!_ ”

(Tony tried to reassure himself that Darcy angry and crying and screaming at him was much better than Darcy talking about nothing and pretending everything was great.)

“I wasn’t –” But that wasn’t true. He _was_ just going to move on and never talk to her again. That had been his plan. He just hadn’t been able to follow through. He knew now that he never could have, but at the time he had had every intention of never speaking to her again. What a mess. “I’m really sorry, Darcy. I’m not – not _great_ with people and emotions and... and all that. I really messed up. But I’m trying, ok? And I’m sorry.”

“Well, try harder next time!”

And Tony would have flinched, but suddenly his arms were full of Darcy, and the hair at the top of her head was tickling his nose, and she was hugging him so hard it kind of hurt, and he didn’t know if she was shaking from her anger or her crying. For all he knew, he was the one shaking. It didn’t really matter.

“I will. I will. I’m sorry. I promise.” He kept repeating the words into her hair, and maybe his voice was a little shaky, but so what, it wasn’t like JARVIS was around to record it. (Chuck was probably just on the other side of the wall, though). “I might need your help, though.”

Darcy pulled away slightly and looked up at him, his shirt still held firmly in her fists. “No more ignoring me. I can’t… You don’t have to pick up, but you need to at least send me a message. Tell me if you need time, or if something is wrong, or if you’re just not in the mood to talk, ok? I get that… sometimes you’ll need space, or you don’t want to talk about it, or don’t want to talk with me. That’s fine. But just _tell me_ ,” she insisted, emphasizing her words by yanking slightly on his shirt.

“I will. But you need to do the same, Darcy,” he said seriously. “No more lies, ok? If something is wrong, _you tell me_. Even if you think it’ll upset me. Even if I’m what’s wrong. Alright?”

Darcy nodded once, then loosened her right hand from his shirt and lifted it up between them, her fist closed except for her outstretched pinky. It took Tony a second to understand what she wanted, but then he held out his own hand in the same way.

Darcy pulled away her pinky just before he could hook his through hers. “A pinky promise is the holiest promise you can make. You need to really mean it, ok?” She held his eyes and she looked so serious, Tony had to consciously suppress the urge to smile. Even so, the corner of his lip curled up against his will. He nodded, and Darcy’s lips curled up into a matching smile as she hooked her pinky with his and shook it gently. “From now on, we tell each other when something’s wrong.”

Beatrice had arrived home at some point while Tony and Darcy were talking, though neither had heard her arrive.

When Tony accepted Chuck’s invitation to dinner and to stay the night in their guestroom, Beatrice crossed her arms across her chest in a move almost identical to her daughter’s earlier that evening. Then she turned to Darcy and asked her if she wanted to do a mother-daughter sleepover, _just to catch up a little_. Darcy rolled her eyes playfully, but agreed readily.

Tony kept his eyes on his plate and tried not to roll his own eyes at Beatrice’s antics, too relieved he’d fixed things with Darcy to be offended by her implication.


End file.
